War Precautions Act

War Precautions Act 1914
Parliament of Australia
An Act to enable the Governor-General to make Regulations and Orders for the safety of the Commonwealth during the present state of war.
Citation	Act No. 10 of 1914
Enacted by	Parliament of Australia
Date assented to	29 October 1914
Date repealed	2 December 1920
Status: Repealed

The War Precautions Act 1914 was an Act of the Parliament of Australia which gave the Government of Australia special powers for the duration of World War I and for six months afterwards. The Act was made pursuant to the defence power in Section 51(vi) of the Australian Constitution which empowers the federal Parliament to make laws with respect to the naval and military defence of the Commonwealth.

It has been held that during wartime, the scope of the federal Government's power expanded to meet the exigencies of wartime. This expansion allows the federal Government to overcome limits on its other powers and provided constitutional support for the War Precautions Act. During peacetime, the federal Government's powers under the Constitution are limited to specified subject matters; other matters were within the power of the Australian States. Under the defence power, however, the federal government's power is very wide.

Under the War Precautions Act, the federal Government could make regulations about anything that affected the war effort. This resulted in a dramatic increase in the range of federal regulations.

The federal Government also began to exercise powers that it had possessed prior to the war but had chosen not to exercise. For example, it began to levy income tax, which had previously only been levied by the Australian States.

The powers available to the federal Government under the Act were exercisable by regulation. This means that they did not need to be passed by Parliament in order to become law. Any document prepared by the relevant Minister and signed by the Governor-General became law. Many War Precautions Regulations were made in this way.

Some of the activities carried out under the authority of the War Precautions Act include:

There were 3,442 prosecutions under the Act, almost all of which were successful. Penalties ranged from cautionary fines to imprisonment for up to six months.

The Act required all persons over 16 years of age, on leaving Australia, to possess a passport.

Some of the uses of the War Precautions Act were highly controversial. For example, leading up to the referendums on conscription, a Regulation that banned statements likely to prejudice recruiting was used to hamper the anti-conscription campaign. Almost any anti-conscriptionist speech could be construed as offending, and a number of prominent anti-conscriptionists were charged, including John Curtin.

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